2024 Lamborghini Revuelto: Plug-In-Hybrid V-12 Supercar Links Past and Future

The Lamborghini Revuelto is a supercar that’s also a declaration of war, on its segment rivals and Newtonian physics. When Lamborghini launched the Aventador in 2011, the car boasted an output of 691 horsepower, that representing a 30-hp bump over the outgoing Murciélago LP670-4 Superveloce. But even the most basic entry-level Revuelto’s hybridized V-12 will make a staggering 1001 horsepower, a massive 30 percent increase over the 770 horsepower of the last-of-line Aventador Ultimae. Having driven the Revuelto for the first time, we can report that it feels even more exciting than the numbers suggest.

The Revuelto’s huge output is generated entirely without turbocharging. Lamborghini opted to use hybrid assistance to keep its naturally aspirated V-12 alive for another model cycle. The combustion engine still displaces 6.5 liters but now revs to a dizzying 9500 rpm, thanks to the use of finger followers in the valvetrain, just like the Corvette Z06. The most obvious change over the Aventador is the fact the engine has been turned 180 degrees, and it now drives an eight-speed dual-clutch gearbox, which is mounted behind it and powers the rear wheels.

The V-12 makes 814 horsepower in its own right and is assisted by three electric motors. The one at the rear sits inside the gearbox housing and also acts as a starter-generator. Up front, an axial-flux motor drives each front wheel. There is no mechanical connection between the engine and the front wheels or across the front axle. Each of the trio of motors can deliver up to 148 horsepower, but the peak flow rate from the 3.8-kWh battery pack located in the central tunnel between the seats is equivalent to 187 horsepower, making that the peak electrical output.

Our drive took place at Porsche’s Nardò proving ground in Italy, in production-spec cars. (The gawky little warning stickers are a requirement for any car at Nardò with high voltage onboard.) We also got the chance to drive the Revuelto back to back with an Aventador SVJ, the car that set an outright Nürburgring Nordschleife production-car record as recently as 2018.

The Revuelto Interior

Lamborghini admits that one of the few things Aventador owners regularly complained about was the cramped cockpit. The Revuelto’s cabin isn’t palatial, but it does feel appreciably bigger in terms of both headroom and shoulder space. A six-foot driver can wear a helmet without it regularly bumping against the roof. The new car gets a huge 3-D-printed air vent in the center of the dashboard, plus new technology, including three digital displays. A screen in front of the passenger can be configured to relay various shock-and-awe performance statistics. The Revuelto cabin also boasts stowage space, another Lamborghini sports-car first, plus a pair of Porsche-style pop-out cupholders that deploy from above the glovebox.

Like other plug-in supercars, the Revuelto has an EV-only mode, here called Città. This is novel but unexciting—a silent, slow Lamborghini that feels about as quick as a first-generation Nissan Leaf. The EV range will be only around six miles, so Città is intended as a sneak-away stealth mode rather than a regularly used feature. Beyond that, a Hybrid mode starts and stops the V-12 as appropriate, but the vast majority of our time with the car was spent in the powertrain’s Performance mode, which keeps the engine running full time.

Driving the Revuelto

Performance is huge. While we will have to wait to harvest acceleration numbers, the Revuelto proved its superiority over the Aventador SVJ when we chased one on the kilometer-long main straight. Even with Mario Fasanetto, Lamborghini’s chief test driver, at the wheel of the older car, the Revuelto chased it down like a GTP hypercar reeling in a GTD backmarker. Lamborghini claims that the Revuelto gets from 0 to 124 mph in 7.0 seconds—that’s just half a second slower than Bugatti’s figure for the Chiron on the same benchmark. The power-to-weight math puts the quarter-mile in the upper nines following a low-two-second leap to 60 mph.

More important, electrification has removed none of the visceral experience of the V-12. The engine sounds savage when pushed, to the extent that it’s tempting to upshift well before the 9500-rpm rev limiter. Stick with it, though, and the engine pulls harder and harder all the way to its stratospheric redline. And while the Aventador lacked the low-down urge of its turbocharged rivals, the Revuelto’s electric motors give it instant punch even at lower engine speeds. In the Sport and Corsa modes, accelerator response felt as sharp as that of a quick EV. Lamborghini is also proud of having created two different launch-control functions, the more permissive of which (ordered by braking hard when stationary and then stomping on the gas) allows slight wheelspin from the rear.

The different dynamic modes bring big changes to the Revuelto’s character. Although the softest, Strada, doesn’t turn it into a plush grand tourer, it does smooth the transmission and accelerator response and soften the adaptive dampers. Lamborghini says Strada also limits peak output to a mere 873 horsepower, although you’re unlikely to detect that difference in the real world. Choosing Sport increases output to 895 horsepower, stiffens the suspension, and also brings a much more permissive stability-control setting that allows significant low-speed yaw angles before intervening. It also quickens the shifts and adds a head-nodding torque bump to full-throttle upshifts. The max-attack Corsa mode unlocks the full 1001 horsepower and is designed to maximize track performance.

Per Lamborghini’s figures, the Reveulto is 490 pounds heavier than the Aventador, which puts it just north of 4400 pounds, but on track it honestly doesn’t feel as porky as that sounds. Instead, it seems more agile and responsive than its predecessor when they’re driven back to back. The SVJ needs to be wrestled into slower corners and requires throttle discipline to prevent inelegant understeer. The Reveulto’s rear steering and ability to bias torque side to side means it turns in much more keenly, seems to find apexes more easily, and enjoys superior traction on the way out. It is much more stable under hard braking too.

The Reveulto is a car that links Lamborghini’s past and future. Like all its predecessors back to the Miura, it uses a naturally aspirated V-12 engine, although one of unprecedented potency. But it also features a plug-in electric powertrain that, although it has added mass, has brought significant and obvious improvements to the way the car drives (as well as marginally cutting emissions). Buyers have responded—Lamborghini says the first two years of production are already spoken for.

Now, after a drive of the first Revuelto, the big question is how Lamborghini will make something so fast and so exciting faster and more exciting in the spicier variants that inevitably will follow. Yet, somehow, it surely will.

Senior European Correspondent

Our man on the other side of the pond, Mike Duff lives in Britain but reports from across Europe, sometimes beyond. He has previously held staff roles on UK titles including CAR, Autocar and evo, but his own automotive tastes tend towards the Germanic, owning both a troublesome 987-generation Porsche Cayman S and a Mercedes 190E 2.5-16.